Unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
A typical three-stage Clos-network packet switch includes three stages of switch modules assembled to create a packet switch capable of having a large number of ports. These three stages typically include input modules, central modules and output modules. Generally, the more input, central and output modules included in a three-stage Clos-network packet switch, the more ports the switch can support. As a result of an ability to support a variable amount of ports, a three-stage Clos-network packet switch architecture can be considered a scalable switch architecture. Due to the scalability of a three-stage Clos-network packet switch architecture, companies that manage communication networks such as Internet service providers or telecommunication service providers may use this type of architecture to scale their networks to meet customer demands.
Data received at an input port for a three-stage Clos-network packet switch may be partitioned (e.g., into cells) to facilitate movement of the data through the three-stage Clos-network packet switch. However, forwarding partitioned data through a three-stage Clos-network packet switch that has been scaled to include a large number of ports may be complex and difficult. The complexity and difficulty of forwarding the partitioned data may be increased if the partitioned data is to exit the three-stage Clos-network packet switch in the sequence in which the data may have been partitioned.